THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


THE 

OLD  BRICK  CHURCH, 

NEAR 

Smithfield,    Virginia. 


BUILT    IN    1632. 


A  PAPER  READ  BEFORE  THE  VIRGINIA  HISTORICAL  SOCIETY 
TUESDAY,  DECEMBER  22,  1891, 

BY  R.  S.  THOMAS,  A.  M.,  L.  B., 

Smithfield,  Virginia. 


REPRINTED  FROM 

VIRGINIA  HISTORICAL  COLLECTIONS,  VOL.  XI, 
1892. 


REPRINTED   BY 

GEORGIE  WAYNE  DAY 

IN    MEMORY  OF 

JAMES  DAY 

THOMAS  DAY 

JOHN  DAY 

VESTRYMEN 


THEOLDBRICKCHURCH, 

NEAR  SMITHFIELD,  VIRGINIA. 


BUILT    IN    1632. 


It  is  my  object  to  prove  that  this  Church  was  built  in  1632,  and 
I  shall  prove  it, 

1 .  By  the  existence  at  that  early  day,  of  such  a  strong,  religious, 
sentiment,  as  demanded  a  house  of  worship  to  the  living  God. 

2.  By  tradition. 

3.  By  lately  existing  records;  and — 

4.  By  the  bricks  and  mortar  of  the  Church  itself. 

This  last  proof  is  absolutely  conclusive,  and  I  might  rely  on  it 
solely  and  alone,  but,  in  one  or  two  hundred  years  hence,  its  gen- 
uineness might  be  questioned;  and  hence,  whilst  priceless  records 
are  still  extant,  and  important  witnesses  still  live,  it  is  a  matter  of 
the  gravest  moment,  and  of  the  highest  duty,  to  preserve  their 
concurrent  testimony. 

1st.   The  Existence  of  the  Sentiment. 

The  existence  of  a  temple  to  the  God  to  be  worshipped  proves 
the  belief  in  that  God,  for,  without  a  belief  in  him,  there  would  be 
no  temple  for  his  worship.  The  stronger,  and  more  enthusiastic, 
the  belief,  the  surer,  and  more  certain,  it  is  to  manifest  itself  in  a 
house  of  worship.  Did  our  ancestors,  then,  bring  with  them  a 
strong,  potent,  courageous,  belief  in  the  God  of  Calvary,  and  a 
strong  evangelical  zeal  in  His  behalf? 


VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 


This  question  cannot  be,  correctly,  answered,  without  some 
slight  glance  at  antecedent  history  —  enough  only  to  arouse 
thought  to  action,  and  to  enable  you  to  bring,  before  yourselves,  a 
mirror  of  the  times. 

In  1483,  Hans  Luther,  a  German  miner,  a  citizen  of  the 
county  of  Mansfield,  a  slate-cutter  by  trade,  had  born  unto  him 
a  son,  who,  displaying  uncommon  activity  of  mind,  was,  by  man- 
ifold sacrifices  of  the  father,  placed  at  the  Latin  school  of  Eisle- 
ben  in  that  county.  The  brightness  of  the  boy,  and  the  ambition 
of  the  father  that  the  son  should  rise  above  his  station  in  life, 
induced  him  to  undergo  still  further  privations  and  hardships, 
so  that  he  might  place  the  boy  in  the  larger  school  at  Eisnach. 
Poverty  pressed  hard  on  that  father  and  son,  and  drove  the  son 
to  go  into  the  streets  of  Eisnach,  and  sing  songs  for  alms  that  he 
might  eke  out  a  miserable  existence.  God  had  given  him  a 
sweet  tenor  voice,  and  that  voice  fell  enchantingly  upon  the  ears 
of  Ursula  Cotta,  the  wife  of  the  Burgomaster  of  Eisnach,  who, 
learning  the  history  of  the  talented  boy,  sent  him  to  Urfurst, 
where  in  1505,  he  took  his  master's  degree  and  graduated  with 
distinguished  honors. 

At  Urfurst,  the  bold  and  earnest  preaching  of  Weinmann 
arrested  his  attention,  stung  and  awakened  his  conscience,  and 
sent  him  to  a  diligent  and  protracted  study  of  the  scriptures. 

In  1507,  the  Elector  of  Saxony  appointed  him  a  professor  in 
the  recently  (1505)  founded  university  of  Wittenburg,  which  he 
soon  made  famous  by  the  severity  of  studies,  the  brilliancy  of  his 
chair,  the  perfect  mastery  of  the  early  fathers  of  the  Church, 
the  profound  knowledge  of  the  scriptures,  and  the  burning  elo- 
quence of  his  pulpit. 

In  1517,  John  Tetzel  sought  to  replenish  the  Papal  exchequer 
by  the  sale  of  indulgences,  and  Martin  Luther,  shocked  at  the 
sale  of  the  mercies  of  heaven  for  the  money  of  man,  nailed  his 
ninety-five  theses  to  the  doors  of  Castle  church,  bade  defiance  to 
the  Pope  of  Rome,  summoned  the  world  to  denounce  the  errors 
of  the  Papal  Church,  and  to  correct  and  reform  its  creed. 

The  disputations  of  Luther  at  Augsburg  with  Cajetan,  and 
at  Leipsic  with  John  Eck,  ended  with  the  Diet-at- Worms,  Nurem- 
berg and  Spires,  and  the  attention  of  the  world  was  arrested  and 


THE   OLD    BRICK    CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  5 

centered  upon  the  grandeur  of  the  preacher,  and  the  sublimity 
of  the  truths  he  boldly  announced,  and  bravely  defended. 

Melancthon,  Bucer  and  Oecolampadius  rallied  around  the  hero, 
and  grandly  aided  in  spreading  the  revived  gospel. 

Zwingli  from  the  mountain  heights  of  Switzerland,  caught  a 
glimpse  of  the  new  religion,  and  held  up  the  torch  to  Calvin,  of 
France,  whose  long,  subsequent,  residence  at  Geneva  banishes 
from  the  general  recollection  his  birth  and  manhood  in  France, 
and  his  ecclesiastical  training  in  the  Church  of  Rome. 

John  Knox  heard  the  voice  of  Zwingli  and  of  Calvin,  and 
aroused  all  Scotland  with  his  stubborn  zeal  and  burning  enthu- 
siasm. 

The  new  learning,  and  the  new  religion,  crossed  the  Scottish 
border  and  the  English  Channel,  and  the  English  champions  of 
the  cross  kept  step  with  those  of  Germany,  Switzerland,  France 
and  Scotland,  and  Rogers  and  Hooper,  and  Farrar  and  Ridley, 
and  Latimer  and  Cranmer,  in  fire  and  in  faggot,  attested  the 
divine  truths,  protested  against  the  enormities  of  Rome,  pro- 
claimed the  gospel,  that  founded  in  Judea,  consecrated  on  Cal- 
vary, hidden  in  the  darkness  of  the  mediaeval  times,  was  resur- 
rected by  Luther,  and  proclaimed,  anew,  to  the  world  by  his 
gathering  hosts  of  enthusiastic  followers. 

But  Clement  V,  of  Rome,  did  not  yield  the  indulgences,  the 
penances,  the  annates  that  supplied  the  coffers  of  his  Church; 
the  masses  that  appealed  to  the  imaginations  of  the  multitude; 
the  auricular  confessions  that  made  the  minister  of  the  flock  the 
priest  of  the  household;  the  prayers  for  the  dead;  the  actual 
corporal  presence  of  God  in  the  wine;  and  the  traditions  that 
hedged  about  and  upheld  his  Church. 

Charles  V  of  Spain  the  Netherlands  Naples  and  of  Austria; 
Francis  I,  of  France,  Philip  II,  of  Spain,  Torquemada,  Ximenes, 
the  Inquisition,  Catherine  de  Medici,  the  massacre  of  St.  Barthol- 
omew, the  reign  of  Bloody  Mary,  the  persecutions  of  the  Luther- 
ans in  Germany,  the  Huguenots  in  France,  and  the  Protestants 
in  England,  all  show  the  terrible  rage  of  the  Church  of  Rome, 
and  the  equally  resolute  energy  of  the  revived  faith  to  escape 
from  the  thraldom  that  had  so  long  enslaved  it,  and  its  grand 
determination  to  plant  the  standards  of  the  cross  upon  the  ram- 
parts of  a  nobler  and  higher  religion,  that  appealed  from  the 


6  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

fallibility  of  man  to  the  infallibility  of  God,  and  from  a  faith  in 
the  Pope  to  a  faith  in  Jesus  Christ. 

This  energy,  awakened  in  England  in  the  time  of  Henry  VIII, 
intensified  in  that  of  Edward  VI  and  Bloody  Mary,  was  power- 
fully augmented  by  the  two  editions  of  the  book  of  Common 
Prayer  in  1548  and  1552,  and  the  rapid  multiplications  of  the 
Bible. 

The  edition  of  Wickliffe  of  1384  had  been  enlarged  and 
enriched  by  the  editions  of  Tyndall  in  1530  and  of  Coverdale 
in  1535,  whose  labors  and  sufferings,  in  poverty  and  in  alien 
lands,  were  crowned  with  such  success,  that  from  foreign  and 
from  native  presses  came  the  editions  of  1538,  the  version  of 
1539,  the  Geneva  edition  of  1560,  the  Bishop's  Bible  of  1568, 
and  the  authorized  version  of  1611. 

Whilst  some  of  these  editions  were  issuing  from  the  press, 
Bloody  Mary,  in  1588,  passed  from  the  scenes  of  life,  and  Eliza- 
beth ascended  the  throne  of  England. 

Then  Protestantism,  bruised,  mangled,  and  burnt,  rose  from 
the  ground,  nobler  for  its  sufferings,  and  more  resolute  for  its 
afflictions. 

"Glory  to  God  in  the  highest,  peace  on  earth,  and  good  will 
to  man,"  was  its  paean,  and  "Go  ye  unto  all  the  world  and  preach 
my  gospel  to  every  creature,"  was  accepted  as  its  divine  mission. 

Under  the  influence  of  these  feelings,  Christopher  Newport, 
John  Smith,  Edward  Maria  Wingfield,  Bartholomew  Gosnold, 
John  Ratcliffe,  John  Martin,  George  Kendall,  and  their  associ- 
ates, set  sail  on  the  iQth  of  December,  1606,  from  Blackwall, 
England,  in  the  ship  Susan  Constant,  of  one  hundred  tons,  in 
charge  of  Newport  with  seventy-one  men;  in  the  Gods-peed,  of 
forty  tons,  in  charge  of  Gosnold,  with  fifty-two  men,  and  in  the 
pinnance,  the  Discovery,  of  twenty  tons,  in  charge  of  Ratcliffe 
with  twenty  men,  and  landed  at  Jamestown  on  the  1 3th  of  May, 
1607,  bringing  with  them  the  sentiments  of  Englishmen,  the 
laws  of  England,  the  Church  of  England  in  its  minister,  the  Rev. 
Robert  Hunt,  and  their  charter,  written  by  Sir  Edward  Coke 
and  Sir  John  Doddridge.  That  charter  declares,  "their  desires 
for  the  furtherance  of  so  noble  a  work,  which  may,  by  the  provi- 
dence of  Almighty  God,  hereafter  tend  to  the  glory  of  His 
divine  majesty,  in  propagating  the  Christian  religion  to  such 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  7 

people  as  yet  live  in  darkness  and  miserable  ignorance  of  the 
true  knowledge  and  worship  of  God,  and  may  in  time  bring 
infidels  and  savages  living  in  those  parts  to  human  civility,  and 
to  a  settled  and  quiet  government,"  and  the  adventurers  are 
instructed  "to  provide  that  the  true  word  and  service  of  God 
and  Christian  faith  be  preached,  planted,  and  used,  not  only 
within  every  of  the  said  colonies  and  plantations,  but  also  as 
much  as  they  may  amongst  the  savage  people  which  do  or  shall 
adjoine  unto  them,  or  border  upon  them,  according  to  the  doc- 
trine, rights,  and  religion  now  professed  and  established  within 
our  realme  of  England." 

In  the  second  charter  of  May  23,  1609,  written  by  Sir  Francis 
Bacon  and  Sir  Henry  Hobart,  it  is  declared  in  its  2Qth  article: 
"And  lastly,  because  the  principle  effect  which  we  can  desire,  or 
expect  in  this  action,  is  the  conversion  and  seduction  of  the  peo- 
ple in  those  parts  unto  the  true  worship  of  God  and  Christian 
religion,  in  which  respect  we  should  be  loath  that  any  person 
should  be  permitted  to  pass  that  we  suspected  to  effect  the  super- 
stitions of  the  Church  of  Rome;  we  do  hereby  declare  that  it  is 
our  will  and  pleasure  that  none  be  permitted  to  pass  in  any  voy- 
age, from  time  to  time  to  be  made  into  the  said  country,  but  such 
as  shall  have  taken  the  oath  of  supremacy,"  that  the  King  of 
England  was  the  head  of  the  Church,  and  not  the  Pope  of  Rome. 

Again,  in  the  third  charter  of  March  12,  161 1,  prepared  by  the 
same  parties,  "the  power  and  authority  was  given  to  minister 
and  give  the  oath  and  oaths  of  supremacy  and  allegiance,  or 
either  of  them  to  all  and  to  every  person  and  persons  which 
shall  at  any  time  or  times  hereafter  go  or  pass  to  the  said  colony 
in  Virginia." 

And  they  brought  with  them  not  only  the  charter,  but  a  mag- 
nificent letter  of  advice  written  by  the  Rev.  Richard  Hakluyt, 
prebendary  of  Westminster,  historiographer  of  the  East  India 
Company,  and  the  last  sentence  is  in  these  words:  "Lastly  and 
chiefly,  the  way  to  prosper  and  achieve  good  success  is  to  make 
yourselves  all  of  one  mind  for  the  good  of  your  country  and 
your  own,  and  to  serve  and  fear  God,  the  giver  of  all  goodness, 
for  every  plantation  which  our  Heavenly  Father  hath  not  planted 
shall  be  rooted  out." 

frown's  "Genesis  of  the  United  States." 


8  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

Just  as  soon  as  these  adventurers  landed  at  Jamestown,  they 
offered  up  prayer,  and  extemporized  a  church,  which,  Captain 
Smith  informs  us,  was  only  an  "awning  or  old  sail  which  we  hung 
to  three  or  four  trees  to  shadow  us  from  the  sun ;  our  walls  were 
rails  of  wood;  our  seats  unhewn  trees  till  we  cut  planks;  our 
pulpit  a  bar  of  wood  nailed  to  two  neighboring  trees.  In  foul 
weather  we  shifted  into  an  old  rotten  tent,  for  we  had  few  better, 
and  this  came  by  way  of  advertising  for  new." 

And  there,  in 

"A  wild  and  lonely  region,  where,  retired 
From  little  scenes  of  art,  great  Nature  dwelt 
In  ample  solitude," 

these  men  worshipped  as  primeval  man  worshipped  when 

"The  groves  were  God's  first  temples.    E'er  man  learned 
To  hew  the  shaft  and  lay  the  architrave, 
And  spread  the  roof  above  them.   E'er  he  framed 
The  lofty  vault  to  gather  and  roll  back 
The  sound  of  anthems;  in  a  darkling  wood 
Amid  the  cool  and  silence  he  knelt  down 
And  offered  the  Mightiest,  solemn  thanks 
And  supplication." 

"Compared  with  this,  how  poor's  religious  pride, 

In  all  the  pomp  of  method  and  of  art, 

When  mere  display  to  congregations  wide, 

Devotion's  every  grace  but  the  heart." 

Their  next  church,  Captain  Smith  informs  us,  was  "a  homely 
thing  (the  log  church)  like  a  barn  set  in  crochets,  covered  with 
rafts,  sedge  and  earth,  and  so  were  the  walls."  Others  followed, 
from  time  to  time,  as  circumstances  dictated,  until  the  one  was 
built,  the  remains  of  which  are  still  at  Jamestown  in  an  utterly 
abandoned  condition. 

Captain  Smith,  describing  the  habits  of  the  adventurers,  says: 
"First  they  enter  into  the  church  and  make  their  prayers  unto 
God,  next  they  return  to  their  houses  and  receive  their  propor- 
tion of  food."  (Vol.  II,  p.  5,  of  Smith's  History.) 

In  1611  they  built  a  "new  towne,"  which  they  called  Henrico 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  9 

after  Prince  Henry,  "a  handsome  church,  and  the  foundation  of 
a  better  laid  to  be  built  of  bricke,"  and  near  it  on  the  other  side 
of  the  river  "a  faire  framed  parsonage"  for  Master  Whitaker. 

In  building  churches  they  were  stimulated  not  only  by  the  zeal 
of  the  individuals  and  of  the  nation,  but  by  the  injunctions  of 
King  James  I. 

As  early  as  1617  he  addressed  a  letter  to  George  Abbott,  the 
then  Archibishop  of  Canterbury,  in  which  he  said:  "You  have 
heard  ere  this  time  of  the  attempt  of  diverse  worthie  men  an' 
subjects  to  plant  in  Virginia  (under  the  warrant  of  our  Letters- 
Patent)  people  of  this  Kingdom,  as  well  as  for  enlarging  of  our 
Dominion  as  for  the  propagating  of  the  Gospel  among  the  Infi- 
dels, wherein  there  is  good  progress  made  and  hope  of  further 
increase;  so  as  the  undertakers  of  that  plantation  are  now  in 
hand  with  the  erecting  of  some  churches  and  schools  for  the 
education  of  the  children  of  those  barbarians,  which  cannot  but 
be  to  them  a  very  great  charge,  and  above  the  expense  which  for 
the  civil  plantation  doth  come  to  them.  In  which  we  doubt  not 
but  that  you,  and  all  others  who  wish  well  to  the  increase  of 
Christian  Religion,  will  be  willing  to  give  all  assistance  and 
furtherance  you  may,  and  therein  to  make  experience  of  the  zeal 
and  devotion  of  our  well-minded  subjects,  especially  those  of  the 
clergy. 

"Wherefore,  we  do  require  you,  and  hereby  authorize  you,  to 
write  your  letters  to  the  several  Bishops  of  the  Dioceses  in  your 
Province,  that  they  do  give  order  to  the  ministers  and  other 
zealous  men  of  their  Diocese,  both  by  their  own  example  in  con- 
tribution, and  by  exhortation  to  others,  to  move  our  people  within 
their  several  charges  to  contribute  to  so  good  a  work  in  as  liberal 
a  manner  as  they  may,  for  the  better  advancing  whereof  our 
pleasure  is  that  these  collections  be  made  in  the  particular  parishes 
for  several  times  within  these  two  years  next  coming;  and  that 
the  several  accounts  of  each  parish,  together  with  the  money's 
collected  be  returned  from  time  to  time  to  the  Bishop  of  the 
Dioceses,  and  by  him  be  transmitted  half-yearly  to  you,  and  so  to 
be  delivered  to  the  Treasurer  of  the  Plantation  to  be  employed 
for  the  Godly  purposes  intended,  and  no  other." 

With  such  sentiments  animating  king,  bishops  and  people  in 
the  mother  country  and  in  the  Colony,  the  first  legislative  assem- 


10  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

bly  held  on  this  continent  was  convened  at  Jamestown,  in  "the 
Quire  of  the  Church,"  on  Friday,  June  30,  1619,  and  the  second 
sentence  in  the  record  is  this:  "But  forasmuche  as  men's  affaires 
do  little  prosper  where  God's  service  is  neglected,  all  the  Bur- 
gesses took  their  places  in  the  Quire  till  prayer  was  said  by  Mr. 
Bucke,  the  Minister,  that  it  would  please  God  to  guide  and  sanc- 
tifie  all  our  proceedings  to  his  own  glory  and  the  good  of  this 
plantation."  ! 

That  assembly  enacted  "that  for  laying  a  surer  foundation  of 
the  conversion  of  the  Indians  to  Christian  Religion  cache  town, 
citty,  Burrough  and  plantation  do  obtaine  unto  themselves  by 
just  means  a  certaine  number  of  natives'  children,  to  be  educated 
by  them  in  true  religion  and  civil  course  of  life." 

That  "all  ministers  shall  duly  read  devine  service,  and  exer- 
cise their  ministerial  functions,  according  to  the  Ecclesiastical 
laws  and  orders  of  the  Churche  of  Englande,  and  every  Sunday, 
in  the  afternoon,  shall  catechise  suche  as  are  not  yet  ripe  to  come 
to  the  communion.  And  whosoever  of  them  shall  be  found 
negligent  and  faulty  in  this  kinde  shall  be  subject  to  the  censure 
of  the  Governor  and  Counsul  of  Estate." 

That  "the  Ministers  and  Church  Wardens  shall  seek  to  pre- 
sente  all  ungodly  and  disorders,  the  committees  whereof,  if  upon 
goode  admonitions  and  mild  reproof?  they  will  not  forbeare  the 
said  skandalous  offences,  as  suspicions  of  whoredomes,  dishonest 
company,  keeping  with  women,  and  suche  like,  they  are  to  be 
presented  and  punished  accordingly." 

That  "if  any  person,  after  two  warnings,  does  not  amende  his 
or  her  life  in  point  of  evident  suspicion  of  Incontincy,  or  of  the 
commission  of  any  other  enormous  sinnes,  that  then  he  or  she  be 
presented  by  the  Church  wardens  and  suspended  for  a  time  from 
the  church  by  the  minister.  In  which  Interim,  if  the  same  person 
do  not  amende  and  humbly  submit  him  or  herself  to  the  churche, 
he  is  then  fully  to  be  excommunicate,  and  soon  after  a  writ  or 
warrant  to  be  sent  from  the  Governor  for  the  apprehending  of 
his  person  ande  seizing  on  all  his  goods,  &c." 

That  "for  reformation  of  swearing  every  freeman  and  Mr. 
of  a  family,  after  thrife  admonition,  shall  give  55.  or  the  value 

1  Senate  Document,  Colonial  Records  of  Virginia,  1874. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  11 

upon  present  demande  to  the  use  of  the  church  where  he  dwelleth ; 
and  every  servant,  after  the  like  admonition,  excepte  his  Mr. 
dischardge  the  fine,  shall  be  subject  to  whipping." 

That  "all  persons,  whatsoever,  upon  the  Sabbath  daye  shall 
frequente  devine  service  and  sermons  both  forenoon  and  after- 
noon, and  suche  as  beare  armes,  shall  bring  their  pieces,  swordes, 
poueder  and  shotte." 

That  "against  excesse  in  apparell  that  every  man  be  cessed  in 
the  churche  for  all  publique  contributions,  if  he  be  unmarried 
according  to  his  owne  apparell,  if  he  be  married,  according  to 
his  owne  and  his  wives,  or  either  of  their  apparel."  ' 

And  the  very  first  act  in  the  published  statutes  of  Virginia  is: 

1st.  "That  there  shall  be  in  every  plantation,  where  the  people 
use  to  meet  for  the  worship  of  God,  a  house  or  room  seques- 
tered for  that  purpose,  and  not  to  be  of  any  temporal  use  what- 
soever, and  a  place  empaled  in,  sequestered  only  to  the  burial 
of  the  dead."  * 

Such  were  a  part  of  the  laws  relating  to  religion  that  were 
enacted  by  the  very  first  legislative  assembly  that  ever  convened 
in  this  country — an  assembly  that  convened  seventeen  months 
before  the  eternally  lauded  pilgrims  ever  landed  upon  Plymouth 
Rock,  and  ten  years  before  the  Colony  of  Salem  and  of  Boston 
increased  their  meagre  numbers  beyond  one  hundred.  And  yet, 
the  historians  of  that  Colony  are  forever  parading  before  the 
world  for  its  worship  the  names  of  a  Cotton,  a  Hooker,  and  an 
Eliott,  who  never  set  foot  upon  this  continent  until  the  Colony 
at  Jamestown  had  for  twenty-seven  years  blazed  the  way  and 
taught  them  wisdom  by  their  sad  experience;  who  never  from 
Puritanical  lips  proclaimed  the  glories  of  their  Maker,  until 
Hunt  and  Whitaker  and  Thorpe  had  laid  down  their  lives  as  a 
sacrifice  to  their  duty.  The  State  and  the  Church  that  can  boast 

of  the  evangelical  services  of  a  Robert  Hunt,  Richard  Bucke, 

Glover,  Greville  Poole,  William  Wickham,  Alexander  Whitaker, 

William  Mease  or  Mays, Macock,  Thomas  Bargrave, 

Robert  Paulet,  David  Sandis,  William  Bennett,  Robert  Bolton, 
Jonas  Stockton,  Thomas  White,  Haut  Wyatt, Hopkins, 

'Senate  Document,  1874. 
*  Hening,  Vol.  I,  p.  122. 


12  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

Pemberton,  William  Cotton,  and  others,  who  came  be- 
tween 1607  and  1622,  animated  by  as  pure  a  zeal  as  ever  fired 
the  breast  of  a  Peter  or  a  Paul,  permits  them  to  rest  not  only  in 
oblivion,  but  covered  with  all  the  opprobrium  that  Puritanism 
can,  by  direction  or  indirection,  heap  upon  them — ministers  of 
the  Cross  of  Christ,  who  by  their  lives  and  their  speech  said  as  did 
the  brave  and  undaunted  Whitaker,  "Why  is  it  that  so  few  of 
our  English  ministers  that  were  so  hot  against  the  surplice  and 
subscription  come  hither  where  neither  is  spoken  of.  Doe  they 
not  wilfully  hide  their  talents,  or  keep  themselves  at  home  for 
fear  of  losing  a  few  pleasures;  be  there  not  among  them  of  Moses 
his  minde,  and  of  the  Apostles,  that  forsook  all  to  follow  Christ. 
But  I  refer  them  to  the  Judge  of  all  hearts  and  to  the  King  that 
shall  reward  everyone  according  to  his  talent."  "Awake  you  true- 
hearted  Englishmen,  you  Servant  of  Jesus  Christ,  remember  that 
the  plantation  is  God's  and  the  reward  your  countries.  .  .  .  And 
you,  my  brethren,  my  fellow  labourers,  send  up  earnest  prayers 
to  God  for  his  Church  in  Virginia,  that  since  his  harvest  heere 
is  great,  but  the  labourers  few  he  would  thrust  forth  his  labourers 
into  his  harvest:  and  pray  also  for  me,  that  the  ministration  of  his 
Gospel  may  be  powerfull  and  effectuall  by  me  to  the  salvation  of 
many,  and  to  the  advancement  of  the  Kingdome  of  Jesus  Christ, 
to  whom,  with  the  Father,  and  the  holy  spirit,  bee  all  honour  and 
glorie  forever  more,  Amen." 

Such  were  the  sentiments  that  animated  the  missionaries  of  the 
early  church,  whom  it  is  now  fashionable  to  deride,  and  whose 
true  Christian  zeal  is  aspersed  by  the  Puritans  of  the  North,  who, 
as  early  as  1629  shipped  John  Morton6  and  John  and  Samuel 
Brown  *  back  to  England  for  no  crime  save  that  of  eating 
Christmas  pies  and  using  the  book  of  Common  Prayer;  who,  in 
1630,  took  away  the  citizenship  of  the  Rev.  William  Bloxton,' 
and  compelled  him  to  sell  his  property  at  an  enormous  sacrifice 
and  move  away  because  he  was  a  minister  of  the  Church  of 
England;  who,  by  1680,  had  exiled  every  Episcopal  minister  in 
all  New  England  but  one — old  Father  Jordon,  who  was  too  poor 


*  McConnell's  Hist,  of  American  Episcopal  Church,  p.  36. 

*  Bancroft's  History  of  the  United  States,  p.  349. 
'  McConnell,  p.  39. 


THE    OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  13 

and  too  "broken  in  fortune  and  in  spirit  to  move;"  "  who  in  1644, 
in  the  very  depths  of  winter,  drove  Roger  Williams9  from  his 
church  in  Salem,  through  the  ice  and  snows  of  Massachusetts,  to 
the  Indian  wilderness  of  Rhode  Island,  so  that  he  did  not  "for 
fourteen  weeks  know  what  bed  or  bread  did  mean,"  and  "had  no 
house  but  a  hollow  tree;"  who,  in  1657,  exiled  Ann  Breden,  and 
whipped,  imprisoned  and  mutilated  her  companions  by  slitting 
first  one  ear,  then  the  other,  and  then  "bored  their  tongues  with 
red  hot  irons;"  who,  in  1659,  imprisoned  Wenlock  Christison  and 
twenty-seven  of  his  companions,  and  rounded  the  catalogue  of 
crimes  by  hanging  Marmaduke  Stephenson,  William  Robinson, 
William  Seddra  and  Mary  Dyer. 10 

Hang  the  Culpeper  brick  on  the  gallows  of  Mary  Dyer,  and 
let,  at  least,  the  Puritan  press  close  his  mouth  on  the  subject  of 
intolerance,  and  the  irreligious  character  of  the  early  colonial 
ministers  of  Virginia! 

And  when  it  is  remembered  that  the  State  of  Virginia  never, 
even  in  the  slightest  manner,  punished  one  of  her  citizens,  save 
and  except  for  a  premeditated  and  defiant  violation  of  the  law — 
a  law  that  since  1689  only  required  the  place  of  worship  to  be 
designated,  and  then  only  by  a  fine  of  a  few  shillings — let  that 
brick  be  encircled,  not  with  animosities,  but  with  all  the  chari- 
ties that  ought  to  be  extended  to  those  who  flagrantly  violate, 
as  well  as  to  those  who  enforce  her  ancient  and  time-honored 
statutes. 

The  spirit  that  animated  the  early  colonial  ministers  was  the 
zeal  of  Hunt,  Bucke  and  of  Whitaker,  which  demanded  churches 
for  the  worship  of  the  God  whom  they  adored,  and  these  they 
built  at  Jamestown  and  everywhere  else  as  rapidly  as  possible. 

In  1621,  if  not  before,  they  built  a  church  on  the  Pembroke 
farm,  in  Elizabeth  City  county,  the  brick  foundation  of  which 
was  found  by  the  Rev.  John  Collins  McCabe,  D.D.,  about  the 
year  1850. 

I  come  now  to  the  date  of  the  erection  of  the  Old  Brick  Church, 
and  I  expect  to  prove  that  it  was  built  in  1632. 

8  McConnell,  p.  39. 

"Bancroft,  p.  367-77. 

10  Bancroft,  pp.  452  to  458. 


14  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

2d.   The  Tradition. 

The  universal  tradition  everywhere,  and  at  all  times,  univer- 
sally, prevalent,  in  my  county,  is,  that  the  Old  Brick  Church 
alluded  to  was  built  under  the  care  and  superintendence  of  one 
Joseph  Bridger,  the  father  of  General  Joseph  Bridger,  who  lies 
buried  on  the  farm  now  owned  by  James  Davis,  about  a  mile  and 
a  half  distant  from  the  old  church — a  farm  that  was  called  by 
General  Joseph  Bridger  in  his  will  in  1683,  "The  White  Marsh 
Farm,"  and  is  so  known,  and  so  called,  to  this  day. 

This  General  Joseph  Bridger  was  in  his  day  the  most  promi- 
nent man  in  his  county. 

He  was  born  in  1628,  and  in  1657,"  at  tne  a§e  °f  (29)  twenty- 
nine,  he,  with  John  Brewer,  represented  this  county  in  the  Gen- 
eral Assembly  of  Virginia.  In  1663,"  he  is  again  a  member,  and 
this  year  appears  as  Captain  Joseph  Bridger,  and  is  a  member  of 
every  important  committee,  but  one. 

In  1664,  he  is  a  commissioner  to  adjust  the  boundary  line  of 
Virginia  and  Maryland." 

In  1666,"  he  is  one  of  the  commissioners  of  this  State  to  confer 
with  the  commissioners  of  Maryland  and  of  North  Carolina,  rela- 
tive to  their  tobacco  interests. 

In  this  year  M  he  is  also  a  member  of  the  General  Assembly, 
and  appears  there  as  Adjutant-General  Bridger. 

In  1675,"  he  is  a  member  of  the  Council  of  State,  and  a  colonel 
in  the  Indian  wars. 

In  i676-'77,"  he  is  a  member  of  the  court  at  Green  Spring. 

In  1676,  his  surrender  is  demanded  by  Nathaniel  Bacon,  Jr.,1* 
characterized  as  "the  rebel." 


"  Hening,  Vol.  I,  p.  431. 

"  Hening,  Vol.  II,  p.  197. 

"  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  303. 

14  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  303. 

"  Hening,  Vol.  II,  p.  225,  II.  249. 

"  Hening,  Vol.  II,  p.  328,  and  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  348-9. 

17  Hening,  Vol.  II,  p.  548  and  551-7,  60. 

"  Neill's  Virginia  Carolorum,  p.  363. 


THE    OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  15 

In  1677,  he  is  a  member  of  the  court  at  the  Middle  Planta- 
tions, and  is  a  witness  to  the  will  of  Sir  William  Berkeley.  " 

In  1680,  he  is  a  Councillor  of  State  and  Commander-in-Chief 
of  the  forces  in  Isle  of  Wight,  Surry,  Nansemond  and  Lower 
Norfolk;  and  Colonel  Arthur  Smith,  of  Isle  of  Wight,  and 
Colonel  John  Lear  and  Major  Milner,  of  Nansemond,  are  under 
his  command." 

In  1683,  he  is  a  member  of  the  Council  of  State  and  of  the 
General  Court,  along  with  his  Excellency,  Thomas,  Lord  Cul- 
peper,  Governor,  &c.,  Mr.  Secretary  Spencer,  Mr.  Auditor  Bacon, 
Major-General  Smith,  Colonel  Philip  Ludwell,  Colonel  William 
Cole,  Ralph  Wormley,  Esq.,  Colonel  Richard  Lee,  Colonel  John 
Page,  and  Colonel  William  Byrd.M 

The  last  codicil  to  his  will  bears  date  April  Qth,  1685,  and  it  is 
acknowledged  in  open  court,  which  was  then  held  at  The  Glebe, 
about  a  mile  from  Smithfield,  where  the  court-house  was  located 
until  1752,  when  it  was  moved  to  Smithfield.  In  his  will  he 
makes  special  mention  of  his  friends,  Lieutenant-Colonel  John 
Pitt,  Mr.  Thomas  Pitt,  and  Colonel  Arthur  Smith,  and  of  his 
brick  house  on  the  White  Marsh  farm,  where  he  resided,  the 
brick  basement  of  which  still  exists  to  this  day.  And  though  the 
field  has  been  constantly  cultivated,  from  time  immemorial,  right 
up  to  the  house,  and  right  up  to  the  very  edge  of  the  grave,  yet, 
the  innumerable  bricks  still  lying  scattered  everywhere  around, 
attest  the  largeness  and  the  magnificence  of  that  house.  In  1890, 
Mr.  Edward  Pitt,  a  descendant  of  the  Pitts  above-mentioned,  and 
a  firm  believer  in  the  truth  of  the  old  tradition  we  are  consider- 
ing, now  an  aged  man,  a  resident  for  many  and  many  a  long 
year  on  that  White  Marsh  farm,  as  owner  and  as  tenant,  showed 
me  the  tomb  of  General  Bridger,  the  basement  of  his  house,  and 
told  me  he  had  frequently  picked  up  bricks  with  the  prints  of  the 
feet  of  fowls  and  of  dogs  on  them,  made  whilst  they  were  soft, 
showing  that  they  had  been  burnt  on  or  near  the  farm. 


"Hening,  Vol.  II,  p.  548-51-7,  60. 

M  Colonial  Papers,  No.  63,  in  Record  office,  London,  as  published  in  the 
Richmond  Dispatch,  July  6,  1890. 

"Hening,  Vol.  Ill,  p.  557. 


16  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

General  Bridger  died  on  the  I5th  day  of  April,  1686,  the 
owner  of  a  very  large  amount  of  personal  property,  and  more 
than  twelve  thousand  acres  of  land  in  Isle  of  Wight  county, 
besides  an  unknown  amount  in  Surry,  James  City,  and  in  Mary- 
land. He  was  buried  in  the  field  near  his  house,  and  on  his 
marble  slab  there  is  this  inscription,  which  is  still  perfectly 
legible: 

SACRED 

To  Ye  MEMORY  OF 

THE  HoNble  JOSEPH  BRIDGER 

Esq.  CoUNCEL'r  OF.  STATE.  IN  VIRGINIA 

To  KiNG  CHARLES  Ye  2.d 

DYI'NG  APRIL  Ye  15:  A:  D:  1689 

AGED  58  YEARES  MOURNFULLY  LEFT 

His  WIFE  3  SONS  &  4  DAUGHTERS 

Does  Nature  silent  mourn  &  can.  dumb,  stone 
Make  his  true  worth  to  future  Ages  knowne 

Excels  exprefsion  Marble  f ure  will  keep 

His  Mem'ry  best  yl  ever.  on.  his  grave  fhall  weep 

Here  lies  ye  late  great  Minifter.  of  State 

That  Royal  virtues  had  &  Royal  fate 
To  Charles  his  Councels  did.  fuch.  honrs  bring 
His  own  exprefs  fetched  him  t'  attend  ye  king 

His  Soul  yl  evr  did  wth  vigour  move 

Nimbly  took  wing,  soared  like  it  felfe  above 

For  ye  bright  stars  ner'e  layfily.  decline 

But  in  an  inftant  shoot  y.1  ceafe  to  shine 

His  wife,  Hester,  was  living  as  late  as  1698,  and  as  Madame 
Bridger  witnessed  the  will  of  Colonel  John  Lear  of  Nansemond. 
His  son,  William,  died  in  1704.  His  son,  Joseph,  died  in  1712. 
His  son,  Samuel,  died  in  1713.* 


"  I  am  indebted  to  W.  G.  Stanard,  Esq.,  for  the  following  information 
relative  to  the  Bridgers: 

Colonel  Samuel  Bridger,  Justice  of  the  Peace  in  1691;  William  Bridger, 
Burgess,  1718;  Joseph  Bridger,  Sheriff  of  Isle  of  Wight,  1732;  James  and 
Joseph  Bridger,  Burgesses,  1758,  1761;  James  Bridger,  Burgess,  1765; 
James  Bridger,  Justice  Isle  of  Wight,  1769;  Joseph  Bridger,  Burgess, 
1772;  Joseph  Bridger,  Burgess,  1773-'4 — vacated  seat  in  1774  to  accept  the 
office  of  sheriff. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  17 

His  daughters  were  Martha  Godwin,  Mary,  Elizabeth  and 
Hester;  and  Elizabeth  died  in  1717. 

I  am  particular,  in  giving,  with  some  minuteness,  the  history  of 
General  Bridger,  because  the  tradition  of  the  building  of  the  Old 
Brick  Church  is  immediately  associated  with  him  and  his  father, 
and  is  handed  down  directly  through  many  of  their  descendants 
and  associates,  who  have  always  been  of  the  very  highest  social 
and  intellectual  prominence  in  the  Church  and  in  State,  in  peace 
and  in  war.  No  tradition  could  possibly  descend  through  them, 
which  was  not  founded  on  an  absolute  fact. 

The  names  of  many  of  these  descendants  and  associates,  whose 
families  still  reside  in  the  county  of  Isle  of  Wight,  appear  upon 
an  old  Vestry  book  of  the  Church  now  in  the  clerk's  office  of 
this  county,  which,  commencing  in  1723 — only  six  years  after 
the  death  of  Elizabeth  Bridger — was,  until  1733,  the  Vestry  book 
of  the  Bay  Church  alone,  and  afterwards,  of  it,  and  of  the  Old 
Brick  Church,  until  its  final  entry  in  1777.  In  the  first  entry  in 
this  book  relative  to  the  church  it  is  then  and  there  called  "The 
Old  Brick  Church."  It  was  hoary  with  age  then;  even  then  its 
white  hair  floated  in  the  breeze.  Treating  this  Vestry  book,  for 
manifest  reasons,  as  an  entirety,  it  shows  that  William  Bridger, 
a  grandson  of  General  Bridger,  was  a  vestryman  from  1724  to 
1730;  that  Major  Joseph  Bridger,  another  grandson,  was  a  vestry- 
man from  1735  to  1747;  that  Joseph  Bridger,  a  great  grandson, 
was  a  vestryman  from  1747  to  1749;  that  Colonel  Joseph 
Bridger,  another  great  grandson,  was  a  vestryman  from  1757  to 
1769;  and  that  James  Bridger,  a  grandson  or  great  grandson, 
was  a  vestryman  from  1766  to  1777. 

This  Colonel  Joseph  Bridger,  the  next  most  important  per- 
sonage in  the  tradition,  was  the  associate  and  friend  of  Arthur 
Smith  and  William  Hodsden,  who  were  co-vestrymen  of  the  old 
church,  and  co-trustees  of  the  town  of  Smithfield  in  1752. 

It  is  a  matter  of  absolute  impossibility  for  any  one  to  read  the 
Acts  of  February,  1752,  docking  the  entail  of  the  Arthur  Smith 
lands,  and  the  Act  of  1754,  docking  the  entail  of  the  Joseph 
Bridger  lands,  without  instantly  perceiving,  that  whoever  drew 
those  acts,  were  perfectly  familiar  with  the  entire  history  of  both 
families. 


18  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL   SOCIETY. 

Colonel  Joseph  Bridger  died  intestate  in  1769,  and  left  sur- 
viving him  his  widow  Mary,  and  his  daughters,  Judith  and 
Catherine. 

Mary  and  her  father,  Thomas  Pierce,  on  the  4th  of  January, 
1770,  qualified  as  the  personal  representatives  upon  his  estate, 
and  Robert  Tynes  and  William  Davis  were  the  appraisers  of  that 
estate. 

Mary,  the  widow,  on  the  I7th  of  June,  1773,  married  Josiah 
Parker,  who  was  a  member  of  all  of  the  Conventions  of  the 
State  in  1775,  afterwards  a  distinguished  colonel  in  the  Revolu- 
tionary war,  and  lived  till  1810;  and  their  daughter,  Ann  Pierce 
Parker,  in  1802,  married  Captain  William  Cowper,  United  States 
Navy,  of  Nansemond,  the  gallant  commander  of  the  Baltimore, 
and  the  son,  I  think,  of  that  Captain  John  Cowper  of  the  same 
county,  who  nailing  his  flag  to  the  masts  of  the  brig  Dolphin, 
sailed  out  of  the  waters  of  the  Nansemond  river  into  those  of 
the  Chesapeake,  with  a  vow  that  he  would  attack  the  first  enemy 
that  he  met,  regardless  of  her  size  and  armament,  and  never 
surrender,  and  went  down  at  sea  in  a  death  grapple  with  two  of 
the  enemy,  in  full  sight  of  Fortress  Monroe,  in  that  heroic  manner 
so  graphically  portrayed  in  William  Wirt  Henry's  splendid 
memoir  of  his  glorious  grandsire,  Patrick  Henry  (Vol.  I,  p.  480). 

Mrs.  Cowper  died  in  March,  1849.  She  was  a  woman  of  ex- 
traordinary endowments  and  of  superior  cultivation,  and  had 
enjoyed,  when  her  father  was  a  member  of  Congress  from  1789 
to  1 80 1,  all  the  advantages  that  the  best  schools  in  Philadelphia 
could  give.  Dr.  John  R.  Purdie,  one  of  our  oldest  citizens,  and 
always  one  of  its  most  intelligent  and  distinguished,  called  by 
the  late  Rev.  Philip  Slaughter  "the  venerable  Dr.  Purdie,  the 
most  antique  pillar  of  the  parish,"  now  in  the  eighty-third  year 
of  his  age,  knew  her  well,  was  her  family  physician,  said  of 
her:  "Her  intelligence  possessed  a  State  if  not  a  national  repu- 
tation." She  was  proud  of  her  family,  and  thoroughly  conver- 
sant with  all  of  its  history.  I  have  in  my  possession  her  copy 
of  the  inscription  on  the  tombstone  of  General  Bridger.  It  is 
endorsed  "Inscription  on  the  tomb  of  the  Honorable  Joseph 
Bridger,  Paymaster-General  to  the  British  troops  in  America 

"Suffolk  Sun,  1872. 


THE  OLD   BRICK  CHURCH,   SMITHFIELD.  19 

during  Bacon's  rebellion,  in  the  reign  of  Charles  the  Second  of 
England.  General  Bridger  was  the  son  and  heir  of  the  Joseph 
Bridger,  who  superintended  the  building  of  St.  Luke's  Church, 
in  Newport  Parish,  Isle  of  Wight  county." 

Mr.  N.  P.  Young,  now  in  the  seventy-fifth  year  of  his  age, 
who,  since  1841,  has  been  the  clerk  of  the  courts  of  this  county, 
says  of  her:  "She  was  a  lady  of  great  intelligence  and  varied 
information,  I  was  always  delighted  with  her  conversations.  She 
frequently  spoke  of  the  Old  Church,  and  of  its  ancient  date, 
which  she  always  fixed  as  in  1632." 

Her  copy  of  the  inscription  was  made  after  1827,  for  the  Old 
Brick  Church  was  never  called  St.  Luke's  until  it  was  so  called 
by  the  Rev.  William  H.  G.  Jones,  its  first  rector  after  the  Revolu- 
tionary war,  in  his  report  of  that  year  to  the  Council  of  his 
Church;  and  her  copy,  therefore,  has  all  the  force  and  sanction 
that  could  possibly  be  given  to  it  by  family  pride,  by  personal 
investigation,  not  only  in  the  bloom  but  in  the  full  maturity  of 
her  splendid  powers.  And  the  full  weight  of  this  sanction  can- 
not be  appreciated  without  the  knowledge  that  Colonel  Parker, 
by  virtue  of  his  marriage  with  the  widow  Bridger,  became  the 
custodian  of  a  large  quantity  of  very  valuable  papers  that  related 
to  the  family,  and  to  the  Old  Church,  the  majority  of  which  were 
seized  and  destroyed  by  Tarleton's  men  in  1781,  when  they  en- 
deavored to  capture  Colonel  Parker  at  his  home,  and  the  balance 
were  lost  in  the  war  of  1 8 1 2.  Mrs.  Cowper  was  perfectly  familiar 
with  these  papers,  cherished  them  as  the  jewels  of  her  household, 
and  verbally,  and  in  writing,  transmitted  the  substance  of  them 
to  posterity. 

Judith  Bridger,  her  half-sister,  who  had  the  same  pride  and 
the  same  facilities  for  knowing  the  contents  of  these  papers, 
married  Richard  Baker;  and  Catherine,  her  sister,  married  Blake 
Baker — the  sons  of  Benjamin  Baker  of  Nansemond. 

Richard  Baker  was  the  father  of  the  late  Richard  H.  Baker, 
who  was  born  in  1788,  and  died  in  1871,  in  the  eighty-third  year 
of  his  age.  He  was  from  1834  (with  the  slight  interruption 
occasioned  by  the  late  war)  until  his  death,  a  period  of  thirty- 
seven  years,  the  very  distinguished  judge  of  this  the  second 
judicial  circuit.  He,  too,  was  proud  of  his  descent,  and  had  every 
opportunity,  in  the  eighty-three  years  of  constant  association 


20  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

with  his  kindred  and  people  of  this  section,  to  apply  his  judicial 
mind  to  the  traditions  of  his  family,  and  of  the  church,  in  which 
he  had  an  ancestral  right  to  be  interested.  His  mother,  Judith 
Bridger  Baker,  survived  until  1840  or  1841,  and  he  had  every 
opportunity  of  learning  from  her  all  that  she  knew  of  these 
matters. 

The  present  Richard  H.  Baker,  the  son  of  the  late  judge,  took 
especial  pains  to  learn  from  his  father  and  mother  all  that  they 
had  learned  from  his  grandmother  relative  to  the  Bridgers,  and 
the  traditions  of  the  Old  Church,  and  committed  to  writing, 
during  their  lives,  notes  of  the  conversations  he  had  with  them, 
which  notes  (now  before  me)  say,  "My  grandmother  Baker  was 
Judith  Bridger  of  Macclesfield  in  the  Isle  of  Wight  county, 
great-granddaughter  of  the  Sir  Joseph  Bridger  who  built  St. 
Luke's  Church  in  1632."  This  statement,  then,  has  all  of  the 
endorsement  which  it  is  possible  to  derive  from  the  great  names 
of  Judge  Richard  H.  Baker,  and  of  his  mother,  Judith  Bridger 
Baker. 

In  the  will  of  the  Elizabeth  Bridger,  who  died  in  1717,  mention 
is  made  of  her  daughter  Patience  Milner,  and  of  her  grand- 
daughters Elizabeth  and  Martha  Norsworthy. 

The  third  George  Norsworthy/4  who  died  in  1724 — the  year 
after  the  commencement  of  the  old  Vestry  book  alluded  to — 
married  Elizabeth  Bridger,  the  daughter  of  the  Elizabeth  Bridger 
just  above  spoken  of. 

Joseph  Norsworthy,  a  descendent  of  this  George,  was  born  in 
1771,  and  died  in  March,  1859. 

Mr.  Joseph  C.  Norsworthy,  a  grandson  of  this  Joseph,  who 
Dr.  Purdie  says,  "was  remarkable  for  his  integrity,  his  memory 
and  his  intelligence,"  writes  me  that  "he  told  me  many  times 
that  the  Old  Brick  Church  was  built  in  1632;  that  in  1666  a 
Miss  Norsworthy  was  buried  in  the  aisle  of  the  church,  close  to 
the  chancel.  He  showed  me  the  spot,  and  mentioned  £5  as  the 
burial  fee.  He  also  gave  me  a  history  of  the  re-shingling  of  the 
church  as  he  received  it  from  his  father  and  grandfather;  and  he 
stated  that  there  never  was  a  doubt  in  the  minds  of  any  of  them 
that  the  Old  Church  was  built  in  1632." 

"  Letters  of  J.  C.  Norsworthy  and  family  tree. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  21 

The  history  of  this  re-shingling,  as  received  by  Mr.  Joseph 
Norsworthy  from  his  father  and  grandfather,  and  imparted  by 
him  to  his  son,  Nathaniel,  to  his  grandson,  Joseph  C.,  to  his 
friend,  Dr.  Purdie,  and  others,  was  that  the  Old  Church  was  not 
re-shingled  from  1632  to  1737.  And  the  old  Vestry  book,  to 
which  allusion  has  been  made,  which  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose 
Mr.  Norsworthy  never  saw  (for  the  vestry  was  dissolved  in  1777, 
and  the  courthouse  moved  to  its  present  location  in  1800),  and 
if  he  did,  never  read,  contains  an  important  entry  bearing  directly 
on  this  point,  and  strongly  confirmatory  of  it. 

It  says  that  at  a  vestry  meeting  held  on  the  I  ith  day  of  Octo- 
ber, 1737,  it  was  ordered  "That  Peter  Woodward  do  the  shing- 
ling of  the  church  with  good  cypress  shingles,  of  good  substance, 
and  well  nailed,  for  700  pounds  of  tobacco;  300  pounds  being 
now  levied;  to  be  finished  at  or  before  the  next  parish  levy,  and 
the  church  wardens  to  take  bond  and  security  for  the  payment  of 
the  same." 

The  credit  of  the  discovery  of  this  entry  is  entirely  due  to  the 
indefatigable  research  of  Dr.  Purdie,  who,  in  an  article  in  the 
Southern  Churchman  in  1882,  commenting  on  this  entry,  says: 
"as  the  best  cypress  shingles  are  known  to  resist  the  elements 
more  than  one  hundred  years,  the  date  of  the  building  of  the  Old 
Brick  Church,  as  derived  from  tradition,  must  receive  support 
from  this  record."  And  Bishop  Meade,  in  the  second  volume  of 
his  Old  Churches  and  Families ,  p.  119,  alluding  to  Christ  Church, 
Lancaster  county,  Virginia,  says:  "the  offer  was  cheerfully  ac- 
cepted, and  the  present  house  was  completed  about  the  time  of 
Mr.  Carter's  death — that  is,  about  the  year  1732 — and  exhibits 
to  this  day  (1838)  one  of  the  most  striking  monuments  of  the 
fidelity  of  ancient  architecture  to  be  seen  in  our  land.  Very  few, 
if  any,  repairs  have  been  put  upon  it;  the  original  roof  and 
shingles  now  cover  the  house,  and  have  preserved  in  a  state  of 
perfection  the  beautiful  arched  ceilings,  except  in  two  places, 
which  have  within  a  few  years,  been  a  little  discolored  by  rain, 
which  found  its  way  through  the  gutters  where  the  shingles  have 
decayed."  When,  in  a  few  years  afterwards  the  church  was 
repaired,  "the  shingles,  except  in  the  decayed  gutters,  were  so 
good  that  they  were  sold  to  the  neighbors  around,  and  will  prob- 
ably now  last  longer  than  many  new  ones  just  gotten  from  the 
woods." 


22  VIRGINIA   HISTORICAL   SOCIETY. 

In  confirmation  of  these  observations,  it  may  be  added  that 
the  Old  Brick  Church  was  not  again  re-shingled  until  1821," 
when  a  vestry — the  first  that  was  organized  after  the  war — had  it 
done,  and  made  some  material  alterations  in  the  interior  arrange- 
ments of  the  church. 

During  all  that  period  of  profound  silence  and  absolute  dis- 
use, from  1777  to  1821,  save  very  rare  and  occasional  services, 
the  grand  Old  Church  was  left  the  prey  to  all  the  elements 
and  to  every  despoiler  who  chose  to  raise  his  sacrilegious  hands 
against  it. 

In  1642,*  only  ten  years  after  the  church  was  built,  Mr.  Falk- 
ner  had  charge  of  all  the  churches  in  the  county  of  Isle  of 
Wight.  In  that  year  the  county  was  divided  into  two  parishes, 
the  Upper  and  the  Lower;  and  the  Old  Brick  Church  was  in 
the  Lower  Parish. 

In  1680,"  William  Hodsden  was  the  minister  of  the  church  in 
the  Lower  Parish,  and  also  of  the  church  in  Chuckatuck  Parish. 

In  1746,  William  Hodsden,  a  descendant  of  this  William,  was 
a  vestryman  of  this  Old  Church,  and  so  continued  until  1752. 
He  was  an  intimate  friend  of  Colonel  Joseph  Bridger;  and  was 
with  him,  a  co-trustee  of  the  town  of  Smithfield.  He  married 
Sarah  Bridger,  and  died  in  1797.  He  was  the  father  of  the 
Joseph  Bridger  Hodsden,  who  was  born  in  1776,  and  died  in 
1815;  and  he  was  the  father  of  the  Joseph  Bridger  Hodsden, 
who  was  born  in  1811,  and  died  in  1877;  and  he  was  the  father 
of  the  Joseph  Bridger  Hodsden,  who  gave  me  these  dates.  Like 
the  Norsworthys,  they  were  the  neighbors  of  the  Bridgers,  inter- 
married with  them,  resided  in  the  same  neighborhood,  and  have 
received  and  transmitted  from  father  to  son  the  same  tradition 
of  the  construction  of  the  Old  Church. 

Arthur  Smith  was  a  vestryman  of  the  Old  Church  from  1736 
to  1740;  and  Thomas  Smith,  his  nephew  and  heir-at-law,  was  a 
vestryman  from  1745  to  1751. 

They  were  the  descendants  of  the  Arthur  Smith,  who  with 

*  Joseph  Norsworthy  and  Dr.  John  Robinson  Purdie. 

*  Hening,  Vol.  I,  p.  279. 

*  Senate  Document,  1874. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  23 

George  Hardy,  represented  the  county  in  the  General  Assembly 
of  1644."  He  claimed  descent  from  the  Sir  Thomas  Smith," 
who  was  so  long  the  treasurer  of  the  Virginia  Company  of 
London. 

The  first  Arthur  Smith  died  in  1645,"°  the  friend  of  the  first 
Joseph  Bridger.  He  left  a  son,  Colonel  Arthur  Smith,  who  died 
in  1696,  the  friend  of  General,  the  second  Joseph  Bridger,  and 
was,  together  with  Lieutenant-Colonel  Pitt  and  Thomas  Pitt,  the 
adviser  by  his  will  of  his  widow,  and  like  them,  the  recipient  of 
a  legacy  for  a  memorial  ring. 

The  second  Colonel  Arthur  Smith,  who  died  in  1696,  left  a 
son  (Arthur)  who  died  in  1755,  and  was  the  guardian  of  Colonel 
Joseph  Bridger,  under  the  will  of  his  father. 

The  third  Arthur  Smith,  who  died  in  1755,  left  the  nephew 
Thomas,  spoken  of  above,  who  was  the  father  of  the  fourth 
Arthur,  the  Colonel  Arthur  Smith,  who  was  a  member  of  the 
General  Assembly  of  Virginia  in  1819,  a  member  of  the  Council 
of  State  in  1809  and  1 8 1 6,81  and  a  member  of  Congress  from  1821 
to  1825.  He  died  in  1854,  and  the  date  of  the  construction  of 
the  Old  Church  was  received  by  him  from  ancestors,  who  were 
the  contemporaries  of  all  of  the  Bridgers,  and  he  transmitted 
the  tradition  as  he  received  it. 

Richard  Hardy,  the  vestryman  of  the  church  from  1769  to 
1777,  was  a  descendant  of  the  George  Hardy  of  1644,  and  was 
the  father  of  George,  William,  and  Samuel,  and  of  Nancy,  Han- 
nah and  Sarah. 

Sam  Hardy,  as  he  was,  and  still  is,  familiarly  called,  was,  per- 
haps, the  most  brilliant  man  that  the  county  of  Isle  of  Wight 
ever  produced,  and  as  everything  but  his  name  has  been  allowed 
to  fade  into  oblivion,  I  will  crave  your  indulgence  for  putting  on 
record  something  more  than  the  mere  mention  of  his  name.  He 
was  at  William  and  Mary  in  1776,"  during  the  presidency  of  the 

18  Hening,  Vol.  I,  p.  283. 

29  Miss  Eliza  Cocke's  Genealogical  Tree. 

10  Hening,  Vol.  VI,  p.  308. 

w  Furnished  by  R.  A.  Brock. 

"Catalogues,  pp.  97,  80,  50;  Vestry  Book,  p.  117. 


24  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

Rev.  John  Camm,  who  was  the  rector  of  the  Old  Brick  Church 
in  1745.  He  was,  with  Spencer  Roane  and  John  Page  and  John 
Marshall  and  Bushrod  Washington,  among  the  original  members 
of  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  Society  of  that  College.  Hugh  Blair 
Grigsby  "  speaks  of  him  as  "the  amiable  and  lamented  Hardy," 
"one  of  the  most  popular  and  beloved  of  our  early  statesmen," 
"brilliant,  profound,  and  suddenly  snatched  away,"  and  Lyon 
G.  Tyler*4  calls  him  "the  eloquent  Hardy,  whose  early  death 
extinguished  the  most  brilliant  expectations."  He  entered  the 
House  of  Delegates  about  the  close  of  the  war,  and  remained  an 
active  member  until  he  was  sent  to  Congress  in  1783.  He  died 
in  Philadelphia  whilst  a  member  of  Congress,  on  Monday,  the 
1 7th  of  October,  1785.  His  death  was  announced  in  Congress 
the  same  day,  which  resolved  "that  the  members  as  a  body  would 
attend  the  funeral  the  following  day  with  crepe  around  the  left 
arm,  and  will  continue  in  mourning  for  one  month."  Mr.  Gray- 
son,  Mr.  Read,  and  Mr.  Kean  were  appointed  a  committee  to 
superintend  the  funeral,  and  they  were  ordered  "to  invite  the 
Governor  of  the  State,  the  Ministers  of  Foreign  Powers,  the 
Mayor  of  the  city,  and  other  persons  of  distinction  to  attend  the 
funeral."  The  funeral  expenses  were  £114  95.,  and  they  were 
paid  by  William  Grayson,  who  brought  the  matter  to  the  atten- 
tion of  the  State.  On  the  fth  of  December,  1785,  Judge  Tyler" 
addressed  a  tender  and  loving  letter  to  Patrick  Henry,  the  Gov- 
ernor, in  which  he  said  "his  father  has  been  much  injured  by  the 
war;  his  family  is  large,  and  such  a  sum  as  £150  would  distress 
him  greatly,  as  I  know  he  would  most  certainly  encounter  any 
difficulty  rather  than  not  pay  it;"  and  it  was  paid  by  the  State." 


n  History  of  the  Virginia  Convention,  Vol.  II  (Va.  Hist.  Colls.  X),  1788, 
pp.  137,  226,  and  copy  of  Journal  of  1785,  furnished  me  by  Senator  John 
W.  Daniel. 

**  Letters  and  Times  of  the  Tylers,  Vol.  I,  p.  191. 
"  Virginia  Convention  of  1788,  Vol.  II,  pp.  137,  226. 
"  Letters  and  Times  of  the  Tylers,  Vol.  I,  p.  191. 

11  On  page  342,  of  the  third  volume  of  W.  W.  Henry's  Life  of  P.  Henry, 
is  the  letter  of  P.  Henry,  of  December  12,  1875,  to  "The  Speaker  of  the 
House  of  Delegates,  urging  the  Legislature  to  pay  the  funeral  expenses 
of  the  late  Hon'ble  Mr.  Hardy,  because  of  the  merits  of  the  deceased 
gentleman,  and  of  the  circumstances  which  make  an  application  to  his 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  25 

His  associates  in  Congress  were  Thomas  Jefferson,  William 
Grayson,  Richard  Henry  Lee,  Arthur  Lee,  and  James  Monroe. 
"Monroe  and  Hardy  were  about  the  same  age,  were  in  the 
Assembly  together,  were  on  terms  of  strictest  intimacy,  and  board- 
ed with  Mrs.  Ege  in  Richmond.  When  Monroe  made  his  Southern 
tour,  as  President,  he  called  to  see  his  old  landlady,  who  presently 
appeared,  and  though  thirty-odd  years  had  passed  since  the  death 
of  Hardy,  as  she  threw  her  arms  about  the  neck  of  Monroe,  she 
sobbed  for  "Poor  Hardy."  His  remains  rest  in  Philadelphia, 
where  those  of  Henry  Tazewell,  James  Innes,  Stevens  Thomson 
Mason,  Isaac  Read,  and  other  gallant  and  patriotic  Virginians 
still  repose." 

On  hearing  of  his  death,  Judge  Tyler  "  wrote  the  following 
beautiful  tribute  to  his  memory: 

Ah,  why  my  soul  indulge  this  pensive  mood, 

Hardy  is  dead:  the  brave,  the  just  the  good. 

Careless  of  censure,  in  his  youthful  bier 

The  muse  shall  drop  a  tributary  tear. 

His  patriot  bosom  glowed  with  warmth  divine, 

And  Oh!  humanity!  his  heart  was  thine. 

No  party  interest  led  his  heart  astray: 

He  chose  a  nobler,  though  a  beaten  way. 

Nor  shall  his  virtues  there  remain  unsung — 

Pride  of  the  Senate,  and  their  guide  and  tongue. 

That  tongue,  no  more,  can  make  even  truth  to  please — 

Polite  with  art,  and  elegant  with  ease. 

Fain  would  the  muse  augment  the  plaintive  strain; 

Tho'  the  most  flattering  panegyric  vain, 

When  the  brief  sentence,  youthful  Hardy's  dead, 

Speaks  more  than  poet  ever  thought  or  said! 


surviving  friends  improper."  These  circumstances  are  mentioned  in  Judge 
Tyler's  letter. 

So  the  funeral  expenses  of  the  budding  statesman  were  ultimately 
borne  by  the  State  as  the  last  tribute  it  could  pay  to  his  worth  and  to 
his  genius. 

"Letters  and  Times  of  the  Tylers,  Vol.  I,  p.  191. 


26  VIRGINIA   HISTORICAL  SOCIETY. 

The  elegy  of  Hardy"  on  the  death  of  Michael  Young,  on 
March  26,  1782,  the  sole  known  product  of  his  pen,40  shows  that 
he  possessed  great  poetic  powers. 

"The  curtain's  drawn — the  awful  scene  is  past — 
My  once  respected  friend  has  breathed  his  last. 
Exhausted  nature  sinks  into  repose, 
A  long,  long  sleep  his  feeble  eyelids  close. 
Terrific  death  with  all  its  dire  parade, 
A  conquest  of  his  mortal  part  has  made. 
Cold  are  those  hands  that  tuned  the  pleasing  lyre, 
That  rais'd  the  hero's  ardor,  and  the  patriot's  fire, 
That  made  old  age  awhile  forget  its  years, 
And  eased  the  restless  mind  from  anxious  cares; 
That  soothed,  enraptured,  or  distressed  the  mind, 
Brightened  the  genius,  and  the  soul  refined; 
Harmonious  numbers  never  more  to  sound. 
Alas!  he's  gone;  he  moulders  in  the  ground. 
Pale  is  the  cheek  that  wore  the  blooming  youth, 
Silent  the  tongue  that  spoke  the  voice  of  truth. 
Dried  are  those  tears  that  ne'er  refused  to  flow 
In  tender  sympathy  for  another's  woe — 
Breathless  the  breast  that  glowed  with  filial  love 
For  earthly  parents  and  his  God  above. 
Nor  need  we  end  the  patriot  here: 
He  was  the  tender  brother,  and  the  friend  sincere. 
From  virtuous  precepts  to  virtuous  arts  inclined, 
His  thoughts  exalted,  and  serene  his  mind. 
But  death  tyrannic  aimed  the  fatal  dart — 
It  flew  unerring,  and  it  reached  the  heart. 
He  fell  beneath  the  cruel  tyrant's  power, 
Nipped  in  his  bloom,  like  some  fair  vernal  flower. 


"  Furnished  by  John  R.  Purdie  and  N.  P.  Young. 

**  Since  the  above  was  written  the  third  volume  of  W.  W.  Henry's  Life 
of  P.  Henry  has  been  published,  and  on  p.  268,  I  find  a  letter  from  Hardy, 
dated  New  York,  January  17,  178S,  to  P.  Henry,  Governor,  "enclosing  a 
memorial  of  some  citizens  of  Virginia  praying  to  be  indulged  with  a 
separate  government,"  and  on  pp.  273-7,  I  find  a  joint  letter  from  Samuel 
Hardy  and  James  Monroe,  dated  February  13,  1785,  relative  to  the  location 
of  the  Federal  Capitol. 


THE   OLD   BRICK  CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  27 

But  why  lament?   Why  draw  the  far-fetched  sigh? 

We  all  are  mortal,  and  we  all  must  die. 

His  mortal  part  has  felt  the  tyrant's  sway; 

To  happier  climes  his  soul  has  winged  its  way. 

On  seraph  wings  he  took  a  rapid  flight, 

And  seraph-like  now  revels  in  delight. 

Why  then  dread  death?   Why  fear  to  pass  o'er 

The  gulf  that  parts  from  that  happy  shore? 

Where  death  stalks  not  in  horrible  array, 

Enrobed  in  terrors  that  produce  dismay, 

But  through  verdant  fields  the  kindred  spirits  glide, 

And  flowery  landscapes  charm  on  every  side, 

Whilst  youth  immortal  blooms  on  every  cheek 

With  endless  joy,  and  happiness  complete." 

Mr.  Monroe,  during  the  Convention  of  1829,  pronounced  Mr. 
Hardy  the  most  brilliant  man  of  his  age  that  he  ever  knew.41 

The  State  of  Virginia,  in  1786,  cherishing  his  memory,  named 
the  county  of  Hardy,  now  in  West  Virginia,  after  him,  and 
Hardy's  Bluff,  and  Hardy  District,  in  the  county  of  Isle  of 
Wight,  show  how  his  name  and  family  have  impressed  them- 
selves on  her  heart  and  on  her  memory. 

Archer  Carroll  married  Agnes  Hardy  of  this  family,  and  their 
son,  George  Carroll,  married  Miss  Wrenn.  N.  P.  Young  mar- 
ried Virginia  Carroll. 

The  traditions  of  the  Old  Church  are  fondly  cherished  in  all 
the  branches  of  this  family. 

Robert  Tynes,  the  vestryman  from  1746-1777,  served  with 
every  vestryman  whom  we  have  or  shall  mention,  except  William 
Bridger,  and  could,  therefore,  repeat  to  JOHN  DAY  what  he  learnt 
from  Lawrence  Baker.  He  was,  as  we  have  seen,  the  appraiser 
of  the  estate  of  Colonel  Bridger.  Henry  Tynes,  a  descendant 
of  his,  died  in  Chuckatuck  in  1874,  and  Robert  Tynes,  his  son, 
died  there  in  1891.  I  knew  both  of  them  well,  but  I  do  not  re- 
member to  ever  to  have  conversed  with  either  on  this  subject. 
But  as  they  were  intelligent  gentlemen,  and  lived  only  five  miles 
from  the  Church,  it  is  impossible  for  them  to  have  been  ignorant 
of  its  history. 

41  Dr.  John  R.  Purdie,  from  his  father,  John  H.  Purdie. 


28  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

Nicholas  Parker  was  a  vestryman  from  1760  to  1777.  He  was 
born  in  1722,  and  died  in  1789.  He  married  Ann  Copeland, 
who  was  born  in  1723,  and  died  in  1786.  She  was  the  daughter 
of  Joseph  Copeland  and  Mary  Woodley,  the  daughter  of  Andrew 
Woodley.  Joseph  Copeland  was  probably  a  descendant  of  the 
Rev.  Patrick  Copeland,  who  was  chaplain  on  the  Royal  James  in 
1617,  and  when  near  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  collected  from  her 
officers  and  men  £70  "for  the  good  of  Virginia."  He  also,  on 
the  1 8th  of  April,  1622,  preached  before  the  Virginia  Company, 
of  London,  and  "urged  the  promotion  of  the  noble  plantation 
that  *"  tended  so  highly  to  the  advancement  of  the  Gospel,  and 
the  honoring  of  our  dread  sovereign."  He  spent  fully  £1,000 
sterling  in  Bermuda  for  a  school  for  the  training  of  Indian  chil- 
dren, and  died  between  1649  anc^  I^55<  The  frequency  of  the 
intercourse  between  Bermuda  and  Virginia  suggests  the  migra- 
tion of  the  family  to  this  country. 

Nicholas  Parker  and  Ann  Copeland  were  the  parents  of  the 
Colonel  Josiah  Parker,  who  married  the  widow  Bridger. 

Thomas  Woodley,  the  vestryman  from  1728  to  1755,  was  the 
brother  of  Mary  and  the  son  of  Andrew  Woodley,  who  came 
to  this  country  in  1691  with  his  wife,  Mary,  and  his  sons,  Thomas 
and  Henry,  and  had  born  unto  him  here  John,  who  married 
Francis  Wilson,  and  Mary,  who  married  Joseph  Copeland. 

Thomas  had  a  son  John,  who  married  Catherine  Boykin,  the 
widow  of  Major  Francis  Boykin,  who  was  Catherine  Bryant,  of 
Northampton  county,  North  Carolina.  They  had  a  son  Andrew, 
who  married  Elizabeth  Hill  Harrison,  and  their  daughter  Francis 
was  my  mother. 

Jordan  Thomas,  the  vestryman  from  1746  to  1755,  was  a 
descendant  of  the  Richard  Thomas  whose  will  bears  date  in 
1 68 1.  He  was  the  county  surveyor  and  laid  off  the  town  of 
Smithfield  in  1752  for  Arthur  Smith.  He  lived  to  a  green  old 
age  and  died  in  1807. 

My  mother  knew  Mrs.  Cowper  intimately,  and  like  her  pos- 
sessed a  masculine  mind  and  a  fondness  for  genealogy.  They 
were  archaeologists  of  highest  order.  I  knew  Frederick  P.  P. 


"Neill,  Virginia  Company,  p.  251,  253,  254,  372,  374;  Neill,  Virginia 
Vetusta,  p.  134,  193,  194,  195;  Brown's  Genesis,  973. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  29 

Cowper,  the  son  of  Mrs.  Cowper,  intimately,  and  from  him,  and 
from  my  mother,  I  have  heard,  repeatedly,  the  history  of  the 
Old  Church,  and  in  all  the  branches  of  our  family  the  tradition 
of  its  construction  is  confidently  believed. 

Lawrence  Baker,  the  vestryman  from  1724  to  1757  was  the 
father  of  Richard  Baker,,  who  was  a  vestryman  from  1760  to 
1777,  and  clerk  of  the  county  from  1754  to  1770. 

It  is  believed  that  Benjamin  Baker,  of  Nansemond,  is  a  de- 
secendant  of  the  Isle  of  Wight  branch  of  this  family. 

John  Day  is  the  ancestor  of  Colonel  C.  F.  Day,  of  Smithfield, 
and  his  wife  is  a  granddaughter  of  General  John  Scarsbrook 
Wills,  who  was  a  member  of  all  of  the  conventions  of  1755  and 
1776,  and  prominent  in  the  Revolutionary  war. 

The  traditions  of  the  Old  Church  are  preserved  in  this  family. 

From  the  vestrymen  of  the  Old  Church,  and  from  every  per- 
son and  family  who  has  ever  had  any  official  or  unofficial  con- 
nection with  it,  has  descended  the  same  invariable  tradition. 
And  the  pregnant  fact  must  be  considered,  that  it  has  never  been 
contradicted.  It  would  have  been  contradicted,  if  contradiction 
had  been  possible.  As  everyone  knows,  Nansemond  county  was 
the  early  and  the  congenial  home  of  the  non-conformist.  Its 
boundary  line  is  only  five  miles  distant;  and  it  would  have  been 
perfectly  natural  and  inevitable  for  them  to  have  furnished  willing 
witnesses  against  the  tradition,  if  any  witnesses  at  all,  could  by 
any  possibility,  have  been  found.  Then,  besides,  Benn's  church, 
the  most  famous  Methodist  church  in  this  section,  has  grown 
upon  the  ruins  of  the  Old  Church,  and  antagonistic  as  it  was  in 
its  early  days,  it  has  never  furnished  a  person  to  suggest  a  doubt 
of  the  correctness  of  the  ancient  tradition.  On  the  contrary,  all 
of  its  members,  like  the  Norsworthys  and  the  Hodsdens  are 
zealous  supporters  of  that  tradition. 

The  tradition,  then,  is  the  tradition  of  friends  and  of  foes;  is 
universal;  is  coeval  with  the  Church;  has  always  been  asserted, 
never  denied,  and  must  be  accepted  as  true.  And  it  has  been 
accepted  as  true  by  Dr.  Hawks,  by  Bishop  Meade,  by  Philip 
Slaughter,  by  the  whole  county  of  Isle  of  Wight,  and  by  every 
person  who  has  given  to  this  subject  the  consideration  that  its 
importance  demands. 


30  VIRGINIA   HISTORICAL   SOCIETY. 

3d.   The  Lately  Existing  Records. 

Francis  Young  was  deputy  clerk  of  the  county  of  Isle  of 
Wight  from  1768  to  1787;  and  clerk  from  1787  to  1794.  He 
was  succeeded  by  his  son,  James,  from  1794  to  1800;  by  his  son, 
Francis,  from  1800  to  l8oi;  and  by  his  son,  Nathaniel,  from 
1 80 1  to  1841;  and  Nathaniel  P.  Young,  the  son  of  Nathaniel 
and  grandson  of  Francis,  has  held  the  office  from  1841  to  the 
present  time,  with  the  slight  interval  of  the  days  when  Virginia 
was  a  military  district. 

In  1781,  when  the  courthouse  of  the  county  was  in  the  town 
of  Smithfield  (Nathaniel  Burwell,  the  clerk,  having  left  this  sec- 
tion of  the  State),  the  custody  of  the  records  of  the  county  was 
in  the  hands  of  Francis  Young,  his  deputy  clerk.  He  being  in 
the  regiment  of  General  John  Scarsbrook  Wills,  was  absent  from 
the  county;  but  his  faithful  wife,  learning  that  Tarleton  intended 
to  make  a  raid  on  Smithfield  to  destroy  the  records,  took  and 
buried  them  on  what  is  now  the  farm  of  John  F.  Scott,  near  the 
mill-pond,  in  a  trunk  that  is  now  in  the  clerk's  office.  They  re- 
mained buried  for  a  long  while. 

Dr.  John  R.  Purdie,  the  brother-in-law  of  the  late  Nathaniel 
Young,  in  an  article  in  the  Southern  Churchman  of  October  igth, 
1882,  alluding  to  these  facts,  writes:  "I  have  heard  him  (Na- 
thaniel Young)  say  that  when  a  boy  there  was  in  the  office  an 
old  record  book  containing  vestry  proceedings,  in  which  he  no- 
ticed entries  relating  to  the  Old  Brick  Church,  and  his  recollec- 
tion was  clear  that  they  were  of  the  date  of  1632.  At  the  time 
these  entries  were  discovered  the  book  containing  them  was  in  an 
advanced  stage  of  decay,  caused  by  the  dampness  whilst  they  were 
buried,  as  I  have  stated,  and  soon  yielded  to  the  tooth  of  time. 
Mr.  Young  was  remarkable  for  the  strength  of  his  memory  and 
accuracy  of  statement." 

Dr.  Purdie  has  always  been  remarkable  for  his  antiquarian  re- 
search, for  the  love  of  his  section  and  State,  for  the  strength  of 
his  memory,  and  for  the  accuracy  of  his  statements. 

Mr.  N.  P.  Young,  the  present  clerk,  now  in  the  seventy-fifth 
year  of  his  age,  writes  me:  "He  (my  father)  said  that  for  many 
years  after  he  went  into  the  clerk's  office  there  were  two  old  books 
there  relative  to  the  Church  and  the  proceedings  of  the  vestry,  and 
that  the  older  of  the  two,  being  greatly  damaged  by  having  been 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  31 

buried  in  1781,  was  destroyed  by  worms.  In  this  book  was,  as 
stated  by  him,  the  proceedings  relative  to  the  erection  of  the  Old 
Church.  When  I  entered  the  office  in  1836,  nothing  was  left  of 
this  old  book  but  the  back  and  small  portions  of  the  leaves,  so 
eaten  by  the  worms  that  it  was  perfectly  illegible." 

The  existence,  then,  of  this  old  book,  and  the  substance  of 
its  entries,  relative  to  the  Old  Church  must,  upon  the  testimony 
of  these  living  witnesses,  and  of  the  one  so  lately  deceased,  be 
accepted  as  an  unquestionable  fact. 

4th.    The  Bricks  and  the  Mortar  of  the  Church. 

In  June,  1887,  the  Rev.  David  Barr,  rector  of  Christ  Church, 
Smithfield,  attended  a  convocation  held  at  Old  St.  John's  Church 
near  Chuckatuck.  On  the  Sunday  of  that  convocation  a  very 
severe  storm  of  wind  and  rain  came  up,  which,  with  its  thunder, 
shook  all  that  neighborhood.  On  Monday,  as  he  was  returning 
home,  when  he  came  in  sight  of  the  Old  Brick  Church,  he  observed 
that  the  storm  had  so  shaken  that  Old  Church  that  its  roof  had 
fallen  in,  and  that  a  large  part  of  the  eastern  wall  had  fallen  on 
that  roof.  With  a  sad  heart  he  stopped  and  surveyed  the  dis- 
tressing scene,  but,  plucking  courage  from  disaster,  he  resolved, 
then  and  there,  that  the  Old  Church  should  be  rebuilt,  and  that 
the  most  ancient  building  in  all  America  of  European  construc- 
tion should  be  preserved  to  the  State  and  to  the  Church  which 
had  erected  it. 

Mr.  Emmet  W.  Maynard,  formerly  a  citizen  of  Surry,  had 
recently  moved  into  the  immediate  neighborhood,  and  Mr.  Barr 
at  once  engaged  him,  as  chief  workman,  to  remove  the  fallen 
roof  and  the  encumbering  bricks.  Mr.  Maynard  entered  promptly 
upon  the  work,  and  after  he  had  removed  the  debris  of  the  roof, 
he  then  began  upon  that  of  the  fallen  wall  and  the  scattered 
bricks.  Whilst  so  engaged,  he,  one  day,  found  in  the  southeast 
corner  of  the  Church,  where  the  wall  had  chiefly  fallen,  a  curious 
brick,  which  upon  examination  seemed  to  have  something  cut 
into  it,  which,  by  accident  or  design,  was  filled  with  mortar. 
With  a  sharp-pointed  stick  he  removed  the  mortar  until  first 
dimly,  and  then  clearly,  and  then  still  more  clearly,  was  seen  the 
figures  1632.  Mr.  Maynard  had  so  recently  become  a  citizen  of 
the  county,  that  I  doubt,  if  he  knew  the  significance  of  that 
brick;  but  as  it  came  from  that  portion  of  the  eastern  wall  that 


32  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

had  fallen  in  the  Church,  was  peculiar  in  its  character  and  shape, 
and  had  some  figures  on  it,  which,  probably,  were  made  whilst  the 
brick  was  soft  and  before  it  had  been  burnt,  he  saved  it,  and 
when  Mr.  Barr  next  came  to  the  Church  he  showed  it  to  him  and 
informed  him  when  and  where  and  how  he  found  it.  Mr.  Barr 
told  him  rapidly  and  excitedly  something  of  the  ancient  history 
of  the  Church  and  of  the  importance  of  the  brick,  and  then,  they 
both,  with  the  zeal  of  the  antiquary,  fired  by  the  discovery  of  the 
buried  city  or  lost  treasure — the  proof  of  his  faith — began  a 
search  inside  and  outside  of  the  Church  to  see  what  further  they 
could  find.  Presently  they  came  upon  a  piece  of  broken  brick 
inside  of  the  Church,  and  not  far  from  the  spot  where  the  whole 
brick  had  been  found,  with  a  figure  I  upon  it.  Being  still  more 
excited  by  this  discovery,  they  increased  the  energy  of  the  search, 
and  after  some  hours  of  scrutiny  and  toil,  they  found  on  the 
southeast  side  of  the  Church,  on  the  outside  of  it  and  near  the 
tower,  another  piece  of  brick  with  a  figure  2  on  it.  On  putting 
these  two  pieces  of  broken  brick  together  they  were  delighted  to 
see  that  they  fitted  perfectly.  The  brick  had  been  broken  in  two. 
On  one  part  was  the  figure  I,  on  the  other  part  was  the  figure  2, 
and  the  middle  figures  was  destroyed  by  the  violent  separation  of 
the  brick  in  its  fall.  These  broken  pieces  that  belonged  to  the 
middle  of  the  brick  were  two  small  to  be  then  found,  for  nearly 
the  whole  of  the  rubbish  had  been  removed  and  thrown  away. 
But  here  were  the  pieces  of  the  second  brick,  in  its  make  and  shape 
exactly  like  the  first,  with  the  same  figures  upon  either  end. 
The  conviction  was  then,  and  is  now,  absolute,  on  inspection,  that 
the  middle  figures  were  6  and  3,  making  1632,  like  its  companion 
brick.  Both  had  been  made  by  the  same  parties,  at  the  same  time, 
from  the  same  clay,  burnt  in  the  same  kiln,  put  in  the  same  wall 
near  the  same  place  by  the  same  workman,  and  both  had  been 
deeply  and  firmly  concealed  from  all  human  sight  and  knowl- 
edge from  1632  to  1887,  when  they  were,  simultaneously,  dis- 
closed to  the  world  by  the  voice  of  God  speaking  in  the  storm. 

And  thus  the  Church,  by  its  very  brick  and  mortar,  confirms 
the  -ancient  tradition  of  the  people,  the  truth  of  the  crumbled 
record,  and  of  the  Vestry  book  still  extant,  and  they  all  join  in 
one  consistent  and  harmonious  acclaim  that — The  Old  Brick 
Church  was  Built  in  1632. 


THE  OLD   BRICK   CHURCH,   SMITHFIELD.  33 

The  ministers  of  the  Old  Brick  Church,  besides  Falkner  and 
Hodgen,  so  far  as  known,  were: 

The  Rev.  Thomas  Bailey,  prior  to  and  during  1724. 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Barlow,  from  March  30th,  1725,  to  October, 
1726. 

The  Rev.  John  Gammill,  from  March  Qth,  1729,  to  November 
25th,  1743. 

The  Rev.  John  Camm,  from  March  4th,  1745,  to  a  few 
months  only. 

The  Rev.  John  Reid,  from  March  8th,  1746,  to  April,  1757. 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Milner,  from  February,  1766,  to  May  3d,  1770. 
He  was  a  descendant  of  that  Colonel  Thomas  Milner,  who  was 
a  Justice  of  the  Peace  and  Colonel  in  1680,  who  was  clerk  to  the 
Assembly  in  1684,  and  its  Speaker  in  1691,  and  probably  the 
son  of  that  Milner  who  married  Patience,  the  daughter  of  Joseph 
and  Elizabeth  Bridger. 

The  Rev.  I.  H.  Burgess,  for  the  years  i773-'74>-'75,  and  '76. 

The  Rev. Hubard,  died  on  the  Glebe  in  1802. 

The  Rev.  Samuel  Butler,  occasionally,  1780. 

The  Rev.  William  G.  H.  Jones,  from  1826  to  1832. 

Bishop  Richard  C.  Moore  confirmed  a  class  of  four  in  1820 — 
viz:  Colonel  Brewer  Godwin,  Parker  Wills,  Mrs.  Ann  P.  P. 
Cowper,  and  Margaret  S.  Purdie. 

The  last  marriage  in  the  Church  was  that  of  George  W.  Pur- 
die  and  Evelina  Belmont  Smith,  on  April  26th,  1836. 

LIST   OF   VESTRYMEN   FROM    1724. 

Lawrence  Baker,  vestryman  from  1724  to  1757. 

William  Bridger,  "  "  1724  to  1730. 

Thomas  Woodley,  "  "  1728  to  1755. 

Major  Joseph  Bridger,          "  "  1735  to  1747. 

Arthur  Smith.  "  "  1736  to  1740. 

Thomas  Smith,  "  "  1745   to  1751. 

Jordan  Thomas,  "  1746  to  1755. 

Robert  Tynes,  "  "  1746  to  1777. 

William  Hodsden,  "  "  1746  to  1757. 


34  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

Joseph  Bridger,  vestryman  from  1746  to  1749. 

Colonel  Joseph  Bridger,  "  1757  to  1769. 

Nicholas  Parker,  "  1760  to  1777. 

Richard  Baker,  "  1760  to  1777. 

James  Bridger,  clerk  in  1753,     "  "  1766  to  1777. 

Richard  Hardy,  "  1769  to  1777. 

John  Day,  "  1777. 

There  was  no  election  of  a  vestry  from  1756  to  1777.  It  was 
then  on  the  petition  of  "sundry  inhabitants"  of  the  parish  of 
Newport,  in  the  county  of  Isle  of  Wight,  dissolved." 

The  names  of  the  other  vestrymen  appearing  in  the  old  Vestry- 
book  are  Samuel  Davis,  Mathew  Jones,  Thomas  Walton,  Wil- 
liam Kinchin,  William  Grumpier,  JAMES  DAY,  George  Riddick, 
Mathew  Wills,  Reuben  Proctor,  Nathaniel  Ridley,  John  Good- 
rich, George  Williamson,  James  Ingles,  John  Porson,  John 
Davis,  John  Simmons,  William  Wilkinson,  Joseph  Godwin, 
Henry  Lightfoot,  John  Monroe,  Thomas  Parker,  Hardy  Council, 
Henry  Pitt,  Richard  Wilkinson,  Henry  Applewhaite,  Thomas 
Day,  John  Lawrence,  Hugh  Giles,  Thomas  and  John  Apple- 
whaite, Thomas  Tynes,  John  Eley,  John  Darden,  Dolphin  Drew, 
John  Wills,  William  Salter,  Robert  Barry,  Charles  Tilghman, 
Robert  Burwell,  Miles  Wills,  and  Edmund  Godwin. 

One  grand  historic  landmark  of  the  old  church-yard  has 
recently  yielded  to  the  scythe  of  time,  but  its  exact  spot  and  its 
memory  ought  for  many  reasons  to  be  perpetuated. 

A  grand  old  oak  stood  by  the  side  of  the  road  right  between 
what  is  now  the  burial  lots  of  William  Gale  and  Walter  B.  Jor- 
dan. Under  that  oak  Tarleton  and  his  officers  rested  when  they 
made  a  dash  for  Colonel  Josiah  Parker  in  1781.  Under  that  oak 
Lorenzo  Dow  preached,  Joseph  Norsworthy  and  others  were  con- 
verted, and  he  and  they  there  joined  the  Methodists,  and  laid 
the  foundations  of  the  now  famous  Benn's  church.  Under  that 
oak  elections  were  held,  and  under  it  Samuel  Hardy,  Josiah 
Parker,  James  Johnson,  Arthur  Smith,  Joel  Holleman,  Archer 

"See  Journal  of  the  Convention,  June,  1776,  p.  40;  See  Journal  of  the 
Convention,  December,  1776,  p.  80;  See  Hening,  IX.,  chapter  XX,  p.  317. 


THE   OLD    BRICK   CHURCH,    SMITHFIELD.  35 

Atkinson  and  Robert  Whitfield — all  members  of  Congress  from 
this  county — discussed  the  engrossing  issues  of  their  day. 

Dr.  Purdie,  in  an  article  in  the  Southern  Churchman  in  No- 
vember, 1882,  speaking  of  that  oak,  says:  "oaks  of  gigantic 
proportions  and  of  great  age  stand  near  this  venerable  Christian 
temple.  One  of  them,  the  oldest  and  perhaps  the  largest  of  the 
vegetable  kingdom  family  in  the  county,  if  not  in  Eastern  Vir- 
ginia, was  more  than  twenty  years  ago  measured  by  myself  in 
company  with  the  Rev.  Silas  Totten,  D.D.,  of  the  faculty  of 
William  and  Mary  College,  and  its  circumference  five  feet  from 
the  ground  was  more  than  eighteen  feet.  Under  its  expansive 
boughs  men  now  old  gamboled  in  childhood  and  in  youth.  In  its 
extensive  shade  the  past  and  the  present  generations  have  lunched 
on  protracted  religious  occasions.  On  its  grassy  carpet  Virginia 
militia  have  formed  ranks  and  performed  simple  and  eccentric 
movements.  And  the  loud  harangues  of  legislative  aspirants  and 
political  declaimers  were  ofttimes  heard  from  its  rugged  roots. 
On  the  afternoon  of  a  calm  autumnal  Sabbath  in  1875,  this 
vegetable  giant,  this  patriarch  of  the  forest,  succumbed  to  nature's 
laws,  and  its  mighty  fall  never  to  be  revived,  and  not  to  be 
replaced  in  ages,  it  became  a  huge  mass,  if  may  I  say,  sacred 
timber  and  fire  fuel." 

Not  only  was  this  grand  old  oak  loved  for  the  reasons  given, 
but  because  it,  more,  perhaps,  than  any  of  its  fellows,  was  in  the 
universal  heart  intimately  associated  with  the  tenderest  senti- 
ments. On  its  huge  knees,  purposely  designed  by  nature,  many 
sat,  who,  "Like  Juno's  swans,  still  went  coupled  and  insepar- 
able," and  those  knees  were  so  diverged  and  distant  that  what 
was  said  in  love's  low  tones  on  the  one  side  of  the  faithful  tree 
did  not  reach  the  engaged  ear  on  the  other.  Grand  old  oak, 
how  we  miss  you!  Under  that  old  oak, 

"Whose  boughs  were  mossed  with  age, 
And  high  top,  bald  with  antiquity," 

how  often  have  we  gathered  and  carved  names,  and  kissed  the 
bark,  and  hugged  its  huge  circumference,  believing  it  to  be 
inspired  with  the  touch  and  feeling  of  her  who  had  just  left  it. 
Broader  than  that  which  stood  sentinel  in  Sumner-chase,  it  was 


36  VIRGINIA    HISTORICAL    SOCIETY. 

enshrined  in  sweeter  memories,  for  as  that  had  only  one  Walter 
and  one  Olivia,  this  had  its  hundreds. 

And  this  whole  grove,  abandoned  by  the  service  of  the  Church, 
revered  and  loved  for  its  ancient  memories  and  its  multitudinous 
dead  here  buried,  its  dense,  extensive  and  sacred  shade,  its  solemn 
hush  and  silence  was  our  forest  of  Eden,  where  our  melancholy 
Jacques  and  passionate  Orlandos,  "Sighing  every  minute  and 
groaning  every  hour,"  hung  "odes  on  hawthornes  and  elegies  on 
brambles,"  saying — 

"O  Rosalind,  these  trees  shall  be  my  books, 

And  in  their  barks  my  thoughts  I'll  character; 
That  every  eye  which  in  this  forest  looks 
Shall  see  thy  virtues  witnessed  everywhere." 

And  now,  having  completed  the  history  of  this  grand  old 
church  so  far  as  it  is  known  to  me — not  even  having  ignored  its 
sentimental  associations,  let  me  express  the  hope  that  it  will  soon 
be  restored  to  its  pristine  condition,  and  once  again  unite  in  har- 
mony and  in  love  with  all  other  churches  in  the  evangelization 
of  the  world. 

R.  S.  THOMAS. 


MINISTERS   WHO   CAME    FROM    1607   TO    1622.  37 

A    PARTIAL    LIST    OF    MINISTERS    WHO    CAME    FROM    1607    TO    1622. 

Robert  Hunt  came  in  1607,  died  at  Jamestown,  1609. 

Richard  Bucke  came  in  1610,  died  at  Jamestown,  1624. 

Glover  came  prior  to  1 6 1 1 . 

Poole  came  prior  to  1 6 1 1 . 

William  Wickham  came  prior  to  161 1,  died  at  Henrico,  1638. 

Alexander  Whitaker  came  prior  to  1611,  died  at  Henrico, 
1617. 

William  Mease  or  Mays  came  prior  to  1611,  died  at  Henrico 
after  1623. 

William  Macock  came  prior  to  1616,  died  at  Henrico  after 
1626. 

Thomas  Bargrave  came  prior  to  1618,  died  at  Isle  of  Wight, 
1621. 

Robert  Paulet  came  prior  to  1620. 

David  Sandis  came  prior  to  1620. 

-  William  Bennett  came  prior  to  1621,  died  at  Isle  of  Wight, 
1624. 

Robert  Bolton  came  prior  to  1621,  lived  in  Accomac  and 
Jamestown. 

Jonas  Stockton  came  prior  to  1621,  lived  in  Elizabeth  City 
and  Henrico. 

Thomas  White  came  prior  to  1621. 

Haut  Wyatt  came  prior  to  1621,  lived  in  Jamestown. 

Hopkins  came  prior  to  1622. 

Pemberton  came  prior  to  1622. 

Greville  Pooley  came  prior  to  1622. 

William  Cotton  came  about  1622. 

The  letter  of  the  London  Company  to  the  Governor  and 
Council  of  Virginia,  dated  September  1 1,  1621,  speaking  of  books 
for  the  ministers,  says:  "As  for  books  we  doubt  not  you  will  be 
able  to  supply  them  out  of  the  libraries  of  so  many  that  have 
died." 

R.  S.  T. 


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